Ripping CD-g to MP3-g

[alfalfa4381]

In an earlier post I asked about the key changers in computer based karaoke players vs hardware karaoke players. It seemed to me that the quality of the computer player key changer degraded the quality, even if moving the pitch one or two notches. But recently I noticed while ripping a CDG that I could choose a higher quality setting that would rip the songs using more bit depth (higher resolution). Of course, this produces much larger song files, but it seems to make the key change problem better. Do you all use the highest quality rip settings and therefore deal with larger sound files?

[wiseguy]

I probably rip my songs to a higher bit rate than most. At 128 I can definitely perceive music quality loss from the original and even some songs at 192. So I rip all mine to 256 and I can never tell any difference from the original. Hard drive space is cheap but poor music quality is costly.

[Bigdog]

I say it also matters with the quality or lack of in the PA system you use for playing the music.

Most people that want to become KJs want to do it as cheaply as possible.

[letitrip]

A higher bit rate does help. Much like wiseguy, I too rip all my songs at 256K. The higher bit rate gives the software more information to work with as it calculates the changes you are making to the original track. So this will help with a key changer.

Where it doesn't help is if you choose to change the tempo. This is where sampling rate makes all the difference but unfortunatley very few players can handle changes to sampling rate and to get it has to be matched to the amount of tempo change your making to avoid distorition of the track.

Equipment makes a difference across the board. A common and unfortunate paradox though is that often times the best equipment can actually expose the short comings of other equipment or music tracks or your abilities themselves. However, I wouldn't use that as an excuse for buying cheap equipment, because cheap isn't going to make it sound better, just going to make it harder to detect where the shortcomings lie.

[LarryKaraoke]

I use the highest bit rate available to that program. ( comes from being a Studio Tech.) EQing can help with sound depending on the EQ source. But, be careful you don't OVER EQ, as that can make it worse..lol My mixer at the club, is a Karaoke/DJ mixer and does a very nice job of key change. The key change on the CAVS machine is also pretty good. I do a lot of sound work using Cool Edit Pro for quick work, and it has a not too bad key changer IF you know how to use it AND how to EQ.